From Surfing Sister To Career Girl: Nani Leaves Lilo Behind In Disney’s Latest Remake
"Nobody gets left behind," Nani tells Lilo as she puts her up for custody.
The latest Lilo & Stitch reimagining gave us exactly that – reimagined as whatever the opposite of Lilo & Stitch is.
To summarize, Gantu is gone, so is Jumba's vague Russian accent and personality, and Pleakley no longer serves his cross-dressing disguises. The hilarious sunburnt tourist who drops his ice cream is race-swapped as a Native. Worst of all, with the help of social services, Nani gives up her little sister Lilo (what happened to Ohana means family?) like she’s handing over a lost-and-found item. Lilo ends up with her neighbor, Tutu. And instead of Nani staying in Hawaii and surfing, she wants to become a... checks notes... a marine biologist on the mainland? Forget the fact that Hawaii is internationally recognized for its marine biology programs or that Native Hawaiians often qualify for tuition breaks at schools in their homeland.
In the original Lilo & Stitch, the message was simple and powerful: family comes first. In Disney’s 2025 live-action remake, that message gets scrubbed and swapped for something far more marketable: self-actualization through abandonment. Oh, and trust the state to handle your family matters.
Gone is the emotional rawness of Nani sacrificing her dreams to raise her sister. Gone is the fierce insistence that love means staying, even when it’s hard. The message of the modern film is clear. That is, you’re not empowered unless you leave your family, your culture, and your roots behind.
It's also important to mention that the original Lilo & Stitch was unapologetically Hawaiian, honoring its setting and its people. It didn’t treat Hawaii as just a scenic backdrop for a quirky alien plotline the way this movie did. It was the emotional and cultural foundation of the film. Where the 2002 film celebrated tradition and family, the 2025 version suggests those things are outdated.
Director Dean Fleischer Camp defends the choices, and when asked by Deadline why the story pivoted to Nani’s career ambitions and an updated family dynamic, he said, “I think that was one of the things that we talked about, thematically modernizing and updating for this live-action version — broadening the idea of Ohana and complicating it with a little more nuance. It just felt like the right thing to do.”
He continued, “Given that Nani… was so smart and has had to abandon a lot of these dreams or defer them because she had to take care of her little sister and inherited all this responsibility at such a young age… it just felt like she might not have such an easy time buying into, ‘Nobody gets left behind.'" In other words, the remake doesn’t believe in the original premise, and instead of emphasizing the idea of family and culture, it reinterprets “ohana” not as a promise but as a burden.
It’s worth noting that this film was initially set for a Disney+ release until plans shifted. Producer Jonathan Eirich told Deadline it was an “ongoing conversation,” but that “we’re so excited for this movie to be in theaters.” Camp added, “I was so happy when I found that out… The movie is about Ohana and all those things, so it really enhances the experience.”
But what exactly is the experience here? A version where Ohana means eventually leaving, and modernization means erasing everything that made the original special? There’s something disturbingly consistent in these recent live-action remakes: a pattern of redefining empowerment as hyper-individualism. Instead of making room for stories rooted in place, community, and connection, we’re told that success means escape.
I would argue that real empowerment doesn’t always look like leaving or being selfish. In the case of the original Lilo & Stitch, it's fighting to keep your little sister, even when the system is stacked against you. Sometimes it looks like saying, “This is my home. These are my people. This is enough.”
The original Lilo & Stitch knew that, and that's why it will always remain a classic. The 2025 Lilo & Stitch gave us a story about leaving. The 2002 one gave us a reason to stay.